Recharging our response to HIV
As World AIDS Day approaches on 1 December, Rob Lake executive director of the Australian Federation of AIDS Organisations looks at the changing approach to treating the HIV infection.
World AIDS Day 2012 looms. Thirty years into the AIDS epidemic, it seems amazing we are now hearing frequent, credible references to an end to new HIV infections, to getting to zero and to universal access to HIV treatments. UNAIDS characterised its 2012 Global Report on HIV as moving from despair to hope, though not without some caveats about significant and worsening epidemics and poor responses in Eastern Europe, North Africa and the Middle East.
After two years of significant medical breakthroughs and global targets set out in the United Nations 2011 Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS, we have all the tools we need. The challenge now is to increase access to them and maximise their use, most critically, to ensure that lifesaving antiretroviral treatments are available to all people with HIV who need them.
To do this, we must secure ongoing financial support for the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB and Malaria, as well as ensure that governments do everything in their power to make sure HIV drugs get to their citizens. The financial crisis hit the Global Fund hard, but it has recovered strongly and repositioned itself for this task.
Since the AIDS 2012 Conference in Washington, attended by many Australians including Federal Health Minister Tanya Plibersek, Australian HIV organisations have worked together to formulate a plan that sets out how we can achieve a 50 per cent reduction in new infections along with a significant increase in treatments access and uptake by people with HIV. The Melbourne Declaration, launched at the Australasian HIV/AIDS Conference in October, is that plan.
It’s time to recharge our response. We believe that by making HIV testing easier and faster, we will see a significant increase in the uptake of testing. Simpler testing will also encourage people who may not know they are HIV positive to test. A renewed focus on starting treatments as soon as is practicable will help people with HIV gain the health and prevention benefits from treatments that research has demonstrated. For 30 years, gay men have been the community most affected by HIV in Australia. Regular testing, early diagnosis and access to treatments can help break the cycle of new infections.
For sex workers, people who inject drugs and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, early action, strong peer-driven health education, needle and syringe programs, condom use and appropriate health services have averted significant HIV impacts on these communities. These successes will only be sustained with ongoing vigilance, a supportive legal environment and effective funding for services.
For heterosexual men and women with HIV or at risk of acquiring HIV, information and awareness, access to testing and timely diagnosis will bring the same improved health outcomes. Continuing action to fight stigma and discrimination and fostering supportive and non-judgmental attitudes towards people with HIV can help to end the isolation faced by many.
We are recharging our response to HIV in Australia, by strengthening our prevention responses, building on what works, adding effective new prevention strategies and positioning ourselves for the challenges ahead. We see an end to new HIV infections, world class health for people with HIV and a generation of Australians, particularly Australian gay men, who will not grow up in fear of the threat of HIV.
Rob Lake is the Executive Director of AFAO, the Australian Federation of HIV organisations. AFAO is the national federation for the HIV community response. Its members are all the State and Territory AIDS councils, as well as the National representative organisations; NAPWHA, the National Association of People with HIV Australia; Scarlet Alliance, Australian Sex Workers Association; the Australian injecting and illicit drug users league (AIVL) and the Anwernekenhe Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander HIV /AIDS Alliance. Rob has been ED since 2011. Prior to that he was CEO of Positive Life NSW, the voice of people with HIV. He began his involvement in the fight against HIV in New Zealand in the early ‘80s and has been involved in Australia in various roles since moving here in 1987.
